“Dracula,” the latest from former “triple-threat” composer Frank Wildhorn, will be the first entry in the 2004-2005 Broadway season.

The show’s principal backer – Dutch entertainment mogul Joop van den Ende – was so pleased with a workshop he saw recently that he’s given the go-ahead for a Broadway production in July at the Belasco.

Hewitt, who last appeared on Broadway in “The Rocky Horror Show,” will likely be joined by Len Cariou, as Van Helsing, and Melissa Errico, as Mina.

“Dracula,” which has book and lyrics by Christopher Hampton and Don Black, was first produced at the La Jolla Playhouse in 2001. It was supposed to come to Broadway that season but was derailed by tepid reviews.

The Los Angeles Times said “the ultra-familiar story never opens up into a realm of satisfying musical escapism, or even satisfying schlock.”

The San Diego Union-Tribune went not for the jugular but the obvious with: “‘Dracula’ lacks bite.”

The musical has been much revised since then, however.

If it’s even half-way decent, it could turn out to be something of a comeback for Wildhorn, who only a few years ago was being feted around town for having three musicals running on Broadway at the same time – “Jekyll & Hyde,” “The Scarlet Pimpernel” and “The Civil War.”

Alas, all three turned out to be flops (“The Scarlet Pimpernel” failed in no fewer than three incarnations), and Wildhorn slipped from the scene to his farmhouse in upstate New York.

But he kept plugging away on the piano, cranking out “Dracula” and another show, “Camille Claudel,” which is also rumored to be heading for Broadway in the near future.

And now, like Christopher Lee in those wonderful old Hammer “Dracula” movies, Wildhorn is back, poised to do battle once again with his very own Van Helsing, New York Times theater critic Ben Brantley, who has likened Wildhorn’s scores to bottles of “pop, all carbonated fizz and syrup.”

“Dracula,” by the way, isn’t the only vampire musical in the works.

In November, Warner Bros. produced a stage reading of “The Vampire Lestat,” which has a score by Elton John and Bernie Taupin and is based on Anne Rice’s popular novel.

A little bat told me this one is right up there with “Dance of the Vampires,” the first vampire musical that really sucked.

A memorial service for Jason Raize, the original Simba in “The Lion King,” will be held at 4:30 p.m. on April 8 at the New Amsterdam Theater.

Raize hanged himself on Feb. 3 in Yass, Australia. He was 28.

Raize battled drugs, alcohol and depression, brought on in part by frustration with his career, which never took off the way he had thought it would after his success in “The Lion King.”

He often disappeared for long stretches of time, even when he was working, and at the time of his death had been estranged from his family and friends.

Tom Schumacher, the head of Disney Theatrical, which produced “The Lion King,” said Raize was a “very bright and complicated young man. He was passionate, driven, funny, brilliantly talented and very competitive for success and recognition. His gifts were unique, his magic was rare, but he is not the first to lose himself on this path. I’m shattered by his death. We loved him very much.”